
Book , T^4fi 



s E li M o isr 



IN C0MMEM0R4.TI0:.' OT THE VIUTUES OF 



ABRAHAM LINCOLI^, 



UJELIVEBED IN 



THE FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, 



MEADVII.LE, TA., JU,NE 1, lyG.'), 



BY KEY. J. Y. REYIn^OLDS, I). D. 



meadvillp:, PA.: 
k. lyle white, printed, 

18G5. 



S E R M O TSr 



rs" COMMEMOKiTlON OF THE VIRTUES Or 



.ABRAHAM LINCOL^^ 



DELIVERED IN 



/ 



/ 



THE FIRST PRESBYTERIAX CHURCH, 



MEADVTLLE, VA., JUNE 1, If^fi.i, 



BY RE:Y. J. V. HEYInKILDS, d. d. 

1 1 




MEADVILLE, TA.: 

R. LYLE WHITE, FRINTER, 

] 8 1; 5 . 



Er45n 



OORRESPONBEI^CE. 



.Mkai>\ n.LK, Juno 'i, 18(;5. 
Hkv. Dr. Keynolds: 

Dear Sir: — Will j^oii be kind enougli tu fuiiiisli a c<.|iy nl' your ilis 
course, delivered on the Istinst., illustrative of the cliaracter and virtues 
of the late President Lincoln? It was so appropriate lo the man, and 
the occasion of its deliver\', as to make it desirable it sliould pass into 
print for public i>erusal and future reference. 

When the stormy events through whicii tins country has JK-en passinj; 
for the last four years, come to be re-written by some future historian, 
tile character of those wlio were most prominent in their control and di- 
rection, will be exhibited more or less approvingly, accordinsi; as the opin- 
ions of those who were co-temporaries with them and alike interested in 
the results, shall have been formed and left of rec(jrd, concerninfj them ; 
and, perhaps, no truer source of correct information can or will be found 
by the honest historian than that whicli will emanate from the christian 
ministry. To aid in this respect it is l)elieved your discourse, the deliv- 
ery of which was listened to with the deepest interest, will materially 
contribute ; and it is for this purpose that a copy is requested. 

Yours very truly, 

DAVID DKHK'KSON, 
;, H. 'p.'RICHxMOND, 

D. V. DEKICKSON, 
G. B. DELAMATER, 
Wm. 1:)AVIS, Jk. 

wm. thorp. 



.J Mka1j\ ii.LE, June 14th, IHti.'). 

To THE Hon. I). Derickson, H. H. Ric'h.moxd, G. B. Dei.a.m.\ti;r, Esqrs., 

AND OTHERS : 

Gentleiiieii, — I will be thankfid if I may, in the least measure, aid in 
the imiiortant object of which you speak in 3'ours of the ,')th inst., request- 
ing that I will submit for publication the discourse delivered l)v me, on 
the 1st inst., on the character and virtues of our late belox'ed and I'evered 
President, Abraha.m Lincoln. 

Yielding to j'our judgment that the publication of said discourse may 
be of some service, in the way named, it is herewith placed at your dis- 
posal. 

Very truly yours, 

JOHN V, REYNOLDS. 



SERMON. 



•• Be slill, ;iii(I know tli.-il I ;ini(io<ll I will lie cMilti'd ;iiii()iiy- the Ih-mIIi 
en, Cnatj'ins.) I will he exulted in the earth." — 1'sai.m .\i.\ i: Id. 

•• 'I'lial men may know that Ihoii, w hose name alone 1^ .Iciiov ah. ail the 
-Mo-l lliiih o\crall the e.irlii.'— l's.\i..\i i.\\.\iii : l>!. 

A little more than four years ao-o, or on the Jltli day of 
February, 1861, a man of plain, unassninino- manners, com- 
paratively little known outside a limited circle of ac(inHiiit- 
auce.s, left [u< home in the ca[)ital city of a Western State to 
go to Washington, our National Capitol, to take the oath, and 
assume the duties of President of the United States — to which 
office he had been elected on the 2nl Tuesday of the previous 
November, in conformity with the terms cf the National Con- 
stitution. To many of his own countrymen even, it is prob- 
able the name of Abraham Lincoln was unknown until he win* 
bare it was presented to the American people as a candidate 
for the high office to which he was subsequently elected. Cir- 
cumstances, however, had brought him into the favorable 
notice of not a few men of good judgment and discernment. 
His nomination was, without doubt, a surprise to most per- 
sons even of the political party to which he belonged, and ot 
dissatisfaction to a large number. 

The early history of Abraham Likcoi.n is too well known to 
make it necessary we shoubl narrate it here. All know he 
was born to poverty, spent his youth in laboring with his own 
hands, by honest industry procuring means of sup[)ort and of 
ae([iiiring an education which he himself said was "defective." 
lie was emphatically what we call a "self made man.'' By 
persevering diligence, S[)otless integrity, combined with Btrong 



6 

native common sense, almost intuitive insight into human na- 
ture, remarkable kindness, generosity, and tenderness of heart, 
and unvarying good humor, he arose, or was raised up by 
Providence, to the places in the notice and esteem of his ac- . 
quaintances, an i of trust and public responsibility, which he 
successively occupied, unto the last he held — the highest at- 
tainable by an American citizen — than which there is none 
higher or more honorable in this world. 

But he started forth on that 11th day of February as yet un- 
tried in any very exalted or difficult position, to take that 
liighest of all, by circumstances made far more difficult than 
any one of his predecessors in it had found it. That much was 
already clear. It was yet, by reason of events soon to come 
to pass, to become so fearfully, appallingly difficult and peril- 
ous, that had a revelation of them been made beforehand, thore 
is no man who would not have slnniuk from it. As it was, he 
startel forth deeply impressed with a sense of the vast weight 
of responsibility he was about lo assume. He saw that dang- 
ers threatened the country which he loved with all the devo- 
tion of his patriotic heart, and for the preservation of which 
in all its integrity, he was ready to sacrifice life itself, if need 
be, and was fully prepared, when regularly invested with the 
authority, to exert all the powers and resources the constitution, 
and laws of the National Congress should put in his hands. 
Heavy, dark, angry clouds had already arisen on the southern 
horizon, and were spreading abroad, and rolling their dense 
masses upward, with frightful velocity, and the red lightnings 
were seen flashing wTathfully forth from them, and the distant 
muttered sound of the thunder was heard : the earth was felt 
to tremble and shake thereat. Already treason was making 
its scornful hour's an 1 arrogant threats, speaking derisively of 
Northern strength and courage, casting contempt on Northern 
civilization, education, industries, and societj^ and insulting 
the mitional flag, by reproaches, though not yet by actual vio- 
lence. State after State had declared itself independent of the 
Union, and others were preparing to do likewise. In the 



national Congress perjured traitors were pouring forth their 
insane ravings against the national government, and seeking 
to terrify the loyal States and people with their loud and pom- 
pous denunciations of vengeanoo ; while throughout the South 
everywhere preparations were making for war. Stations for 
recruiting companies and regiments were numerously estab- 
lished ; camps of instruction anl discipline formed ; all other 
business, and thoughts of all else, put away, and the one topic 
become all-absorbing. Arms of every description were being 
collected, ammunition prepared, U. S. forts and vessels seized. 
Nor were the hints, and more or less open threats, of the assas- 
sination of the President elect, before he should, by inaugur- 
ation, become President in fact, few nor moderate. 

Such is a leebly stated outline of the condition of the coun- 
try when Abrauam Lincoln quietly stepped from the door of 
his home — into which he was never more to enter — to start 
forth on his journey to Washington. In his simple parting 
address appear that serious earnestness, that freedom from 
the least semblance of boasting, that recognition of his depen- 
dence on God, that absence of expression of ill will or malice 
towards his personal enemies, and the enemies of his country, 
that show how largely he appreciated the solemnity of his 
situation. His closing remarks were an appeal — not lightly 
nor unmeaningly made — that his friends and neighbors, to 
whom he was bidding good bye, would remember hi n in their 
prayers. Abraham Lincoln believed in God, and believed in 
the power of prayer to God, and earnestly desirel the prayers 
of all good men in his behalf to the God who giveth wisdom 
to them who ask. And he was not ashamed to sa}' to them, 
" Pray for me." Nor ever afterward was he ashamed to ask 
the prayers of christian people in his behalf. And it is prob- 
able — we might perhaps say with truth, it is certain — that 
never before were prayers so many, so constant, so fervent, 
offered for any President of the United States as were offered 
for President Lincoln. And we have no right either to as- 
sume that the least earnest, acceptable, and effectual, were those 



offered continually, and in simple faith, by that long oppressed 
people — the slaves in the Southern States — who had some way 
learned to look on and to him as their deliverer, raised up of 
God to be so. 

So he went forth with malice towards none, with charity for 
all, and God his trust. As he said at a later period, " I shall 
do nothing in malice; what I deal with is too vast for malic- 
ious dealings." The eyes of the nation were upon him during 
his progress to the Capitol, a pi ogress as unostentatious, so far 
as depended on him, as circumstances would admit. Yet it 
could not be otherwise than that large numbers of persons 
would assemble to see and greet him at the stations at which 
he temporarily rested — and not only to see and greet, but also 
to hear his voice. Asa matter of course he frequently address- 
ed his fellow citizens on such occasions. His addresses always 
brief, manifestel the same simple, unostentatious, humble and 
kind spirit. One will search them in vain to discover a par- 
ticle of boasting, or a word of uncharitableness or bitterness. 
They are utterly free from what is usual on like occasions — 
attempts at oratorical display and extravagant [)rofessi(>ns. By 
many tliey were ridiculed, and he sneered at, on this account. 
Perhaps not a few of his friends were at the time dissatisfied 
and rather mortified. But the more discerning and reflecting 
were gratified and eiicouraged. Those brief addresses will be 
read and admired for their spirit of self forgetfulness, of kind- 
ness, ol patriotism, and for the words, simple, plain, butintel- 
ligilde and forcible, of wisdom and good sense, when elabo- 
rate, eloquent, ostentatious, boastful orations, made in like cir- 
cumstances will be quite forgotten. They contained the char- 
acteristics that rendered all his subse<pient addresses, messages, 
and letters on matters of public interest, remarkable. 

It cannot be denied that many of his political frienJs thought 
a grevious mistake ha 1 been male when Aijeauam Lincoln 
was nominated. Events that rai)idly trans[)ired subsecpiently 
to his nomination deepened that fear into painfnl foreboding 
and apprehension and alarm. Many more, however, and they 



9 

were those who best knew him, never faltered in their confi- 
dence in his ability to do what man could do to save the coun- 
try from ruin. There were others, not only in the South, who 
ridiculed him unsparingly, and refused to admit that he pos- 
sessed even an average measure of qualiHcation for any po- 
sition of responsiblity. lie was to be tried, and the result must 
show who were right. With such diverse judgments, hopes, 
and fears regarding him, he drew on himself attention during 
his }>rogre8S, and every word he spake was considered and 
weighed. 

The latter part of his journey— -that from our own State 
C^ap'tol — was made in haste, and witli a measure of conceal- 
ment ; for it had transpired that already treason, in the inter- 
est of the barbarous slave power, had plotted his assassination 
before he should reacli the seat of government, with a view 
itself to seize the reins of Government by violent usurpation, 
and administer it exclusively for its own eivds. The alter- 
native, in case this should fail, was permanent dissolution. 
The danger to his person was for the time escaped, and Abra- 
ham Lincoln arrived in Washington. His journey to that 
city was safely made, for God had a great work for him to do, 
and until that work should be dene nobody could harm him. 
God had him in his own keeping. Only so can we account 
for it that he passed unharmed through all perils while his liie 
Avas valuable and necessary for the preservation of the country, 
and when his death could l)e of advantage to the enemies of 
liifi country, to flill when his fall could not help, but might 
seriously harm those enemies, and could no longer imperil the 
cause of the nation. In the rage of their disappointment at 
his escape, his enemies — we call them so. though the enmity 
at that time was not so much against him, personally, as 
against the cause he represented — gnashed their teeth. They 
affected to ridicule his fears, taunting him with cowardice, in 
which they were joined by many beside, who no doubt really 
believed, as many yet do, or till very lately at any rate, pro. 
fessed to believe, there was no conspiracy against his life 



10 

Those who knew there was, aud who had the best reason to 
know — complicity in it — found it to their own interest to deny 
that any such existed. But Mr. Lincoln and his friends acted 
on certain information, and by his reluctant consent to adopt 
the prudent advice of his friends, the strong human probability 
is that his life was^ saved for the time, and for years. We 
shudder to think, or try to imagine, what would now be the 
condition of the country had the plot then iormed met with 
success. 

A little more than lour years after that progress of Abra- 
ham Lincoln from his Western home to Washington, where 
he was twice inaugurated President of the United States, he 
having been elected to a second term of that high office, the 
first who had been since Andrew Jackson — his mortal remains 
were started ibrth to be returned to the cit}^ of his former res- 
idence, by the same route, substantially, he had taken to go to 
Washington. This starting forth, and the return progress, 
were made amid the tears of the bereaved nation. During 
those four years the nation had learned to know, and admire, 
and respect, and love him. His great worth and merits had 
become manifested and appreciated. Never before had man, 
whether private or titled, king or emperor, such a funeral pag- 
eant — cities, towns, and country poured forth their populations 
to do honor to the illustrious martyred dead. The Capitols of 
five States, besides a number of cities, in turn received, and 
paid magnificent and munificent funeral rites to his remains. 
Tlie highways along which the mournful procession passed 
were lined all the way with sorrowing people. Thousands of 
soldiers — many of whom had been disabled in the service of 
their country — were among, and foremost among,^those who 
sought to look on the placid face of the sleeper, for whom, 
while he yet lived, they had tender afiection, and the sight of 
that face drew from their eyes the big drops which their own 
many griefs and sufferings had never been sufficient to cuise 
to flow. High and low, rich and poor, ol)scure and great, 
alike, with one accord, hastened to pay their tribute of sorrow- 



11 

irisj respect. Women and little children laid on his coffin their 
offerings of wreathed fresh flowers — touching and beautiful 
testimonials to the virtues of the departed, whose gentleness 
and amiability of heart always attracted the weak, the innocent 
and the helpless. Then among the mourners, and none more 
sincere, nor with greater cause than they, are a vast multitude 
from whose bodies and souls the fetters of a long, hard, pa- 
tiently borne bondage have been broken — the ojipressed Afri- 
cans. Some would forbid them to come — but such prohibition 
— a deep shame to those making it — was indignantly and 
properly removed. It was appropriate that these, above all, 
should appear in the great funeral train, for he was, under 
God, their deliverer. The more immediately acting officials on 
the great, imposing, melancholy occasion^the watchers, pall- 
bearers, etc., were Governor s of States, Generals and Ad- 
mirals. Across a wide belt of country from North to South, 
and stretching westward from the Atlantic to the Pacific, bells 
tolled, vallies to mountain-tops lifting up the solemn peal, and 
mountain-tops sending it onward, in muffled sound»to vallies 
beyond. The grand procession marched to the deep toned 
music of minute-guns from hundreds of forts and from cities 
and villages from Maine to Oregon, the accompaniment of 
dirges by bands and choirs from every district. Truly never 
before did man receive such funeral honors, nor ever before 
was man followed to the grave by so many sincere mourners, 
nor ever before over any tomb were so many tears of real sor- 
row shed. 

Nor was all this a mere formal ceremony. No mere device 
of man could have procured such a demonstration for frivol- 
ous effect, for empty parade, or for illegitimate, selfish, or 
political ends. It was the honest, spontaneous out-pouring of 
a nation's grief, which nothing but a sense of great loss, ac- 
companied with hearty admiration, respect and love for the 
deceased, could have procured. Nor had it any element of 
idolatry, as vaguely hinted by a few who stand aloof and look 
coldly, or angrily, upon such an overwhelmingly astounding 



12 

tribute of reverence aud ati'ection to one they had for yeart5 
labored to bring to contempt, and even to the grave where he 
lies, by caricature, abuse and falsehood. It was not idolatry. 
The honors paid were to a man, to hwnan worth and human 
greatness — to a man who had filled the loftiest human station 
in a time of unprecedented peril and difficulty and temptation, 
with complete success, and without contracting a blot upon his 
character of pure integrity, and simple honesty and unaffected 
charity. lie fell, wrapped in a robe of unsullied virtue, on 
which no stain had fastened during four years of such provo- 
cations as few, if any, had ever been called to endure. And 
the extraordinary honors paid his memory were to the man of 
extraordinary private and public worth. Amid all these was 
a most remarkable general acknowledgement of the one only 
Lord God omnipotent who reigneth, and whatever Divine 
worship was paid, was paid to Him who had given Abraham 
Lincoln to this nation and to the world, and who had again 
taken him away. His gift was acknowledged with thanks, 
and His taking it away with submission to His wise, though 
mysterious will. The honors paid were due, and could not 
have been withheld consistently with a just appreciation of the 
great merits and services of the departed, nor without leaving 
a brand of injustice and dishonor upon the nation. To the 
nation itself, for its own credit, they were due, no less than to 
Mr. Lincoln, while their withholding would not have done 
hhn harm, but would have done itself disgrace, and his mem- 
ory a cruel wrong. 

The return progress of Aueaham Lincoln, or rather of his 
mortal remains, ended near the spot whence he started forth, 
at his tomb, near his former home while living. How widely 
different the public estimate of him now, and then ! well set 
forth by the difference of honors paid on the two occasions. Then, 
his best and most appreciating fiiends perhaps felt some mis- 
givings, though little did they, or he, know, or imagine, the 
thousandth part of the difficulties that would arise. Now, all 
true men, all loyal men, all patriots, thank God for His gift of 



13 

Abkaiiam J>,inc!Oln, and see and confess that. He it was who 
having kept him from his infancy and prepared him in com- 
parative obscnrity, brought him forward at the proper, the ap- 
pointed time, put others aside who were better known, and 
seemed to have suj)erior claims, and gave him to be, instrii- 
mentally, the Saviour of the nation, and the emancipator of 
four millions of people from bondage, nmi the preserver of 
peace with other nations. 

Scarcely had the remains of Abraham Lincoln been iu the 
tomb, and the vast procession of mourners separated and gone 
to their homes, before wehear the cry of sorrow and of mourn- 
ing from beyond the Atlantic. Our nearer neighbors had 
mingled their sympathies with our affliction while vre were 
in its first bitter experience ; and very gratifying they were, 
and a powerful healing balm to painful wounds which some ot 
them had inflicted, and which they long continued to irritate. 
But soon we are astonished, and gratified in proportion, at the 
unexpected and wonderfully unanimous out-pouring of lamen- 
tation throughout Europe. The Parlimeut of England, her 
prime minister and noblemen, vie with the untitled, the mer- 
cliants and landlords and manufacturers, and they with custom- 
ers and tenants and laborers, to declare and make known to 
us their sorrow at what they regard, indeed, a common calam- 
ity. France — Emperor and peoplc'-hasten likewise to express 
themselves. The Italian chambers drai)e their hall in mourn- 
ing at the news. The German States, Switzerland, Holland, 
Sweden and Denmark, join in the general tribute of sad re- 
spect. And Russia — always our steadfast friend — is not be- 
hind the other nations in uttering words that tell of genuine 
grief of heart. 

There was never anything like it before. Never before for 
any man of whatsoever station was there such great lamenta- 
tion,such wide-spread and profound regret,extending through all 
classes of societ3^,from kings and emperors down through thesev- 
eral strata in monarchical countries, to the lower orders. Never 
before did any man have bestowed on his memorv sttch marks 



14 

of profound respect, as Abraham Lincoln, the simple hearted, 
the unassuming, the plain, untitled, man of the people. It is 
evident he belonged to the world — we cannot claim him as ours 
alone. Four years ago — or nearly five now — when his name 
was presented before the American people as a candidate for 
the Presidential chair, all in Europe inquired — some in sur- 
prise, some in derision, some from curiosity, echoing the in- 
quiries made by many of our own people — who is Abkaham 
Lincoln ? Now they send over to us the assurance that their 
tears mingle with ours in common sorrow for the loss of one 
of the few truly great men whom the ages produce ; and they 
tell us that in this common sorrow they have found that he was 
theirs as well as ours ; too great to belong to one people, he 
belongs to all the world.* His best friends cannot but feel 
a gratified surprise at this general tribute of high admiration, 
while those who devoted their energies to calumniate, carica- 
ture, and ridicule him, denying him ordinary intellect, and 
charging him with want of humanity, and could see nothing 
but deformity, physical, mental and moral, must stand over- 
whelmed with confusion and shame at what is to them a with- 
ering rebuke. 

It has been becoming more and more evident that in the 
judgment of history a place will be assigned Abraham Lincoln 
by the side of George Washington. He will, apparently, 
grow in greatness as he recedes farther and deeper into the 
past from those who look upon him — only the happiness of the 
truly great. We did not know how valuable a gift of God to 
us he was, till God took him, nor yet do we know, nor can it 

»Siiice that sentence was written we have had the gratification of hear- 
ing the sentiment in it expressed by a gentleman — a Frencli Protestant cler- 
gyman — who was in France when the news of the assassination reached 
tliat country. He said the lamentation and feeling of loss — as if each one 
had met a personal calamity — ^>wr^ universal, so that he was astonished to 
see how strongly Mr. Lincoln liad laid hold of the affections of even a 
people who spake a dilferent language^ He said a lady remarked to him, 
" It seems to me as thongh Mr. Lincoln belonged to us, to me, to every- 
body !" A most noble tribute which only the truly great can secure. 



15 

be known to this generation, nor until there shall have been 
time for the things of the present to reveal their fruits in uses 
tQ come. It has always been the fate of the really great of the 
world not to be known to their own age. We have heard it 
stated on what we regard as good authority that two or three 
years ago, a foreign gentleman connected with a foreign em- 
bassy to this country, was in Washington, standing, and in 
conversation, with several Americans. While so engaged, 
President Lincoln approached in a carriage. The foreign gentle- 
man took off his hat and remained witli it off in respectful at- 
titude, until the President had jussed — he alone having shown 
that mark of respect. On reference being made to it, he ex- 
pressed himself in terms of warm admiration of the character 
and ability of Mr. Lincoln, and said, " Gentlemen, President 
Lincoln is a great man, and you Americans do not know it, 
nor what a prize you have in him — ^}'ou do not appreciate your 
President." It was more than a year since we first heard this 
anecdote, therefore it was not made up after the death of the 
President. Whether literally true or not it contains a truth. 

We have spoken of two events separated from each other by 
an interval i»f a little more than four years, viz: The progress 
of Abraham Lincoln from Springfield, Illinois ; and the return 
of his mortal remains from Washington to Springfield. Of 
the stupendous events of those four years it is not our pur])Ose 
to speak, unless in a very general way. You all know them — 
have carefully noted them as they occurred, and your emo- 
tional nature has been stirred to its lowest depths as they 
l)assed befoie your eyes. But no man can yet adequately 
comprehend them, much less their ultimate results. We are 
too nearthem, to judge of their magnitude. Our nearness docs 
not put us in danger of overestimating, but of under-estimating 
their importance. As one standing at the immediate foot of a 
vast mountain pile can form no just conception of its height, 
or circumferafuce, or proportions, or size relative to other moun. 
tains, but must move from it to a distance, farther and farther 
until the just distance is reached, and as at every stage of the 



16 

increase of the distance, some new feature of beauty, or grand- 
eur, or sublimity, or magnificence of proportions, is revealed, 
until the whole bulk stands forth in awful majesty — its broad 
base resting on everlasting rock, its towering ice-clad height 
piercing the clouds in which it is lost from human view, but 
beyond which he knows it rises into eternal sunshine — so with 
the events of those four years Their history cannot be writ- 
ten in this, nor, perhaps, the next generation — which will be 
occupied with collecting the material. 

But it may be remarked that the necessity of removing to a 
distance from the mountain to gain a correct impression of its 
magnitude and proportions as a whole, involves a sacrifice, a 
loss, in regard to a multitude of details of points of interest 
and beauty, which can be seen only by one standing more cr 
less near to them, accoiding to their several dimensions, or the 
disposition of light and shade. Deep seams, romantic caverns, 
dark ravines through which living streams from numerous 
springs make their way by smooth currents broken by water- 
falls, castellated rocks, etc., disappear as separate things, as 
distance increases, all mingling to make up one grand effect. 
So of the events of the four years. We have intimate, deeply 
impressive knowledge of many things, painful, unspeakably 
sad, as well as many of a different character, which cannot be 
transmitted to the future. The future cannot know of the rapid 
alternation of hopes and fears, of despondency succeeding ex- 
hilaration as defeats followed victories ; of the domestic sor- 
rows and agonies all over the lanl ; and cannot know, or will 
not be made to believe — for which they will hardly be worthy 
to be blamed, for we ourselves admitted belief very slowly 
and some yet stoutly withhold it — the vindictive, fiendish, 
cruelties practiced under the direction of the fierce passions 
begotten of the unhumanizing system of slavery ; the starva- 
tion of prisoners, and their exposure to every species of con- 
temi)t and violence and torture; the cold-blooded massacre of 
surrendered garrisons; the chase and hunt by blood hounds of 
escaped prisouerSwUnion Southern refugees ; the lives of pri- 



ir 

vation led in caves, and swamps, and muuntains, by lojal men 
in the South ; and deaths by murder of thousands of them ; the 
violence done even to the l)odies of the slain — showing a depth 
of hating power and malignity, below that to which the savage 
has descended. On the other hand the future can never know 
the sacrifices, the generous devotion, the wondrous liberality, 
which have been made and ])racticed under the influence of 
christian patriotism ; the bountiful oilerings poured fortli in 
streams never-failing; the personal labors, in evey conceivable 
way and direction, of the women of the country ; the inven- 
tions of the best genius, th'3 appliances of the highest skill of 
the land ; the organized hosts of the Christian and Sanitary 
Commissions — all to minister to the sick and wounded soldiers 
in hospitals and 0:1 battle-fields, and to their destitute families. 
Nor will it be ready to credit the .fierce anger with which the 
loyal pulpit, and loyal ministers, were assailed, and attempted 
to be terrified into silence, by many who did not call themselves 
traitors, because they denounced treason as a sin, and declared 
it a christian duty to stand by the Government, and prayed for 
its rulers, and for its success, when the interests of humanity 
and justice in all the world, were at stake, and only to be 
saved from defeat by its triumph. 

During the four years which separated the two events of 
whicli we spake, the country passed through a most fearful 
crisis, brought on it l.)y a rebellion of unparalelled magnitude 
— the rebellion itself the ofispring of slavery, begun and pros- 
ecuted in its behalf, and for the purpose of forever establishing 
it the dominant political power on this continent, and the test 
of social superiority. It would listen to no reason, would stop 
for no consequences to liberty and our American institutions, 
all which it was madly ready to cast down and trample under 
foot on its way to conquest, and would shudder at no crime 
nor suffering, however appalling. The country was rocked to 
its foundations during those four years, by the earthquake 
march of vast armies ; was desolated by the fiery tempests of 
fierce battle between hosts of unrivalled courage, determination 



18 

and numbers ; was swe[)t by whirlwinds of cavalry forces. 
The storm passei over mountain tops, roared througii the val- 
leys, rushed across wide plains, leaving ruin in its path. The 
world looked on amazed, astounded, with growing wonder and 
increased alarm at beholding such gigantic armies, such tre- 
mendous power, such marvelous creations of genius and in- 
dustry, and energy, and firm purpose, spring uj) asitwereoui 
of the earth. That which has in all former experience requir- 
ed a score, or a century, of years to bring to full growth, they 
saw grown in a day ; or like Minerva full armed from the brain 
of Jupiter, so our armies and navies, fully equipped, spr ng 
from the brain of America. The nations looke 1 on, ihey saw 
our agony, they beheld what was at stake ; but they had no 
word of sympathy nor encouragement. They said — Let the 
United States perish, and let slavery live ! They predicted 
our defeat and ruin, helped the rebel enemy with needed sup- 
plies, and so protracted the war through years. But through 
all that stupeud<jus horror, that time of fearful peril, one heart 
remained strong in hope. In all the hours of deepest darkness 
tliat heart did not despond, and around that strongly hoping 
and trusting heart the people rallied, and it sustained them, 
inspiring with its own strength and confidence, and hope. 

We are now speaking of the human instrumentalities and 
agencies. Not for a moment would we intimate that the peo- 
ple, or their President, put their trust ultimately in any but in 
Him who alone is mighty. In Ilim Abraham Lincoln put 
his trust, and therefore his heart was strong in hope. For as 
we have said, he believed in God, and he believed in the power 
of prayer, and he had said to the christian people " i)ray for 
me," and he knew the christians in the land were praying for 
him and for the country ; and he beneved our cause was just 
and for liberty and human rights, and according to the will of 
God, and that such a cause, sustained by prayer, would trir.mph. 
This, we verily believe, was the secret of that wonderful abid- 
ing confidence which never wavered, no matter how apparent- 
ly gloomy and desperate the state of things, that remained 



19 

steadfast, and because of which he himself acted and moved 
onward as one who never doubted the final issue, thou<^h that 
might be long delayed. 

There was something almost marvelk)us in his unfaltering 
hopefulness. Think of the many incidents that tended to 
cause despair. At the outset, and during the earlier stages of 
the war, traitors and sympathizers with the rebellion, and ene- 
mies of the administration, were everywhere ; in the army,' in 
the navy,' in all the departments and bureaux, as clerks, &c. 
Some of them from time to time deserted to the enemy, carrj'- 
ing with them important information. Others betrayed the 
secrets committed necessarily to them ; and still others witheld 
their sympathy from the government ami gave it to the enemy; 
had not a word of praise or good will for the administration, 
for which they freely expressed contempt, while fur the traitors 
they were ever ready to declare their a liniratlon. The army 
and navy were scattered or surrendered ; battles were lost 
through the treachery or incompetency of commanders. It 
was hard to know whom to trust. The friends of the govern- 
ment wei'e often discouraged, often complained; and weak- 
ened, by their want of trust, the hands of the President. High 
expectations were often suddenly overthrown, and plans that 
promised brilliant success thwartel, a;id instead of success 
were reverses that menaced our cause with utter destruction. 
These, and a great number of other adverse circumstances, 
such as divisions of counsels in Cabinet, and among the loyal 
people on questions of policy on retaliatidn and martial law, 
treatment of disloyal persons, &c., warmly, even angrily dis- 
cussed, might well have driven any man to despair. But still 
President Lincoln hoped on, and kept on pursuing his honest 
convictions. If thwarted, he began again as calmly as if he 
had not been. Never ardent as to speedy victory, he never 
doubted the ultimate issue. If Gol saw fit to postpone peace 
by victory, and for our sins to lea 1 us through other and deep- 
er trials, he was submissive, believing it would be for our good 
and the future health of the nation. This sentiment he beau- 



20 

tilully an 1 grandly made ];^romiueiit in his last inaugural. How 
did he so marvellously endure ? It was because of prayer — 
his own prayer and the prayers of the cliristian yjeople, that 
went up for him without ceasing. 

In all tiiat four years' war how remarkaLly the providence 
of God was maifested, making it evident continually that it 
was His war, and could not stop nor be arrested until His 
great ends of judgment and mercy, ol righteousness and truth 
were secui-ed ; until pride and prejudice were brought low, and 
slavery abolished. Was there ever a more impressive illus- 
tration of the Scripture — '' The wrath of man shall praise 
Thee !" Was there ever a more striking exhibition of the 
tanaticism of madness than in the inauguration of the greatly 
wicked rebellion, avowedly to establish and extend an institu- 
tion w^hich could not fail to be overthrown by the very means 
adopted to secure its perpetuity ! The question had been long 
and anxiously agitated, How shall we get rid of slaver}' ? 
Nothing is more certain nor more capable of conclusive histor- 
ical proof, than that at the time of the organization of our 
Governm/lnt, and for a number of years subsequently, there 
were none of note who defended slavery, none who did not 
admit it to be a great evil, and none who did not look forward 
to a period when it would be abolished by peaceable legislation. 
But there were thought to be serious difficulties in the way, 
and the idea of immediate or sudden emancipation was reject- 
ed with almost entire unanimity by even the best men and 
most thorough haters of slavery, as fraught with great dangers 
to the Whites and ruin to the Blacks. If that universal, or 
nearly so, condemnation of slavery had continued, it is prob- 
able slavery itself would have yet remained for generations to 
come, and the question remain asked and unanswered. How 
siiall we get rid of it ? In the providence of God the first step 
toward a solution was in permitting the theory to be started, 
advocated, and extensively circulated and vehemently main- 
tained, that slavery is a divinely ordered institution, and there- 
tore ought to be made perpetual ; that Africans were intended 



21 

of God to be the slaves of the whites, especially of the whites 
iu tlie Southern States, in cotton, cane, rice, and tobacco grow- 
ing regions. Here was the gorni of treason, at length culmi- 
nating in secession, rebellion and civil war, an 1 these in eman- 
cipation, immediate, sudden, unconditional. And lo ! where- 
as for generations it had been by common consent agreed that 
such an act must be attended and followed by innumerable hor- 
rors, there is no disturbance and not the sligliest apprehension 
of trouble, except on the part and by reason of the bad con- 
duct — not of the degraded, ignorant blacks — but of the en- 
lightened, educated, chivalric, aristocratic whites. Among 
and on account of these, if at all, armies will be required to 
keep the peace ; nobody has the slightest expectation that they 
will be needed to keep the blacks quiet. Nobody fears from 
them. Nobody sleeps less tranquilly l)ecause of knowing they 
are free. So much the war which has abolished slavery has 
taught us, 

Tliose who were exposed to the influences of slavery, were 
by it educated to extravagant and fanatical notions of their 
own superiority in everything manl}-, and to a ridiculous and 
arrogant idea that they had a divine right to govern the coun- 
try, and to an absurd contempt for Northern men.^and every- 
thing Northern — in all which they were too much encouraged 
by many in the North, for selfish or political ends. Govern- 
ed by this weak intatuatiou and impelled by fierce passions 
which would not allow reason to be heard, or truth to speak, 
or })rudence to open her mouth, but imprisoning, scourging, 
uhooting, scalding, hanging them as traitors, they madly plung- 
ed into war which reason, truth, prudence would have told 
them could not but end in their utter discomfiture and in the 
loss of evei'ything they hoped to secure by it, and in bringing 
on themselves, their families, their cities, their cultivated lands 
the very desolation with which they threatened the North, not 
doubting an instant they had the superiority they had boasted 
and proclaimed in noisv, pompous, bombastic declamation, 
until they fully believed it. Providence sufiered them to go 



mad with this insanity that slavery, and with it the bad, false 
condition of society that grew up in connection with it, might 
be destroyed and the country saved and purified, and freed 
from its elements of corruption and weakness which, while 
they remained, were a source of perpetual irritation, and were 
constantly threatning its existence. 

We see the providence of God in the prolongation of the 
war. At its beginning, and for two years or more afterward, 
the large majority of the people in the North would willingly 
have accepted peace with the recognition of slavery wherever 
it then existed, and with additional guarantees that it should 
not be disturbed. If peace had come within two or three years, 
slavery would in great measure have remained unharmed. 
We wished peace, but war was forced upon us by the wicked- 
ness of the rebel foe. We had no choice left us except to take 
up arms, or by refusing to do so proving unfaithful to our coun - 
try and to the trust God had committed to us, and to the rights 
of humanity. We labored to avoid the trial of force, and per- 
haps would have sacrificed much to have done so. But now 
when we review the results of the fearful conflict, we cannot 
but be glad it occurred. We condemn, as enormously crimi- 
nal, those who brought it upon us, and deplore the suffering 
it has caused. But we rejoice for what God, who bringeth 
good out of evil, has in his providence done for us, for what 
has been gained for us and for the world, though purchased at 
so vast a cost. We remember the sacrifices, the thousands 
who have laid down their lives in battle, in prisons — put to 
horrible deaths by starvation and other cruelties — the multi- 
tudes who have as really died for their country in hospitals by 
diseases, the tens of thousands of maimed, the countless hosts 
of bereaved. These things are the necessary accompaniment 
of war. If, on the ground of these sufferings, we must con- 
denm the war we waged against the rebellion, or rather accept- 
ed as the price of our liberties, or must be censured because 
we say we heartily upheld our government in accepting it, 
and are glad it did occur, it can only be either because those 



23 

who do thus condemn or censure us, believe all wars — and so 
that of our revolution — are wicked, or that in this war of re- 
bellion the rebels had right on their side. Against the cost let 
us i)ut the gain. The cost is transient : the gain is for all time. 
This generation bears the cost : all generations to c.mc will 
reap the gain. Freedom has been secured to four millions now 
living, and to their descendants forever. Thousands of mil- 
lions will refer to it the freedom in which they will exult, and 
the emancipation of their race from the slavery and degrada- 
tion to which pride and avarice and pre^judice would have 
permanently consigned them. Moreover against the cost we 
put the destruction of that false, arrogant, corrupt, social struc- 
ture, founded on the baneful institution of slavery ; the eman- 
cipation of millions of poor, debased whites from a state, in 
Some respects, worse than that of slavery. And this war has 
opened up for the church immense and inviting fields for mis- 
sionary and benevolent enterprise. It has done away vast cor- 
ruptions of the Gospel, and gives opportunity of access of a 
pure g. spel to multitudes from whom it was witheld. 

The war was God's own, in one sense, and could not cease 
until his ends were secured. Hence the inefficiency during 
its earlier periods of the leadership of our armies, the par- 
tial sympathy ou the part of many of our officers with the cause 
and institutions of the>so called. Confederacy, and the frequent 
disasters to our arms. The war could not cease until the ma- 
lignity and hatred of the lebels towards the North should be- 
come evident ; a state of feeling that the Northern people 
were very slowly brought to believe existed, knowing their 
own freedom from it, and knowing that no ground for it ex- 
isted, in any treatment the South had received at their hands, 
which had always been yielding, conciliatory, to the prejudice 
and damage of the North, and until the connexion of those 
bitter animosities with, and their dependence upon, slavery 
should be seen, together with its tendency to barbarize and de- 
humanize those who clung with attachment to it as a good 
institution. The war must go on until that institution should 



24 

be overthrown, and until the slave arristocracy with its dan- 
gerous grasp of power, its asserted superiority of civilization, 
its arrogant claims of a sort of Divine right to govern the 
whole country, its contempt for honest labor, and its hostility 
to republican institutions, should be thoroughly overthrown. 
It must go on too, until the pride of the whole nation should 
be humbled, its sins confessed, its dependence on God acknowl- 
edged, and His right to reign admitted ; until the people should 
prostrate themselves before Him in humility, penitence and 
adoration. 

Chief of all, or as the central fact in considering the won- 
derful Providence of Gu:l, we beholl it in the elevation of 
Abraham Lincoln to the Chief Magistracy ; a man of pru- 
dence and moderation ; of wisdom and discernment ; of firm- 
ness mixed with kindness — the heart of the lion joined to that 
of the lamb ; of honesty above suspicion, and a spirit without 
guiljil'; of an equanimity and gentleness and charity which 
nothing could ruffle, or annoy, or disturb ; of freedom from 
ambition of power, from selfishness, and ostentation ; of sim- 
plicity of tastes and habits ; of purity of moral character never 
questioned ; of a wonderful faculty of correctly apprehending 
the state and changes, and progress, of the popular sentiment 
and will ; above all, of a firm undeviating, calm trust in God, 
rendering him always confident of the success, sooner or later, 
of the cause of the Government. Almost unknown on first 
entering upon his magisterial duties, in a time of unparalleled 
confusion and peril, in a great measure untrietl, his friends 
fearful and trembling, he gained and grew in the confidence, 
respect, admiration, and affections of the people, with a rapid- 
ity, and to a degree, perhaps, without another example. This 
was esi)ecially remarkable during the last year or two of his 
life, more em[)hatically so during the last few months, when 
there hal been time to see in their fruits, the wisdom which 
had devised, and the sound julgraent that had executed, his 
principal measures. There was a time, indeel, when his best 
friends doubted, and were dissatisfied. But he was self-reliant 



25 

— not as self-sufficient, or as obstinate and heeJless of advice. 
He was not self-sufficient — iu>t wedde 1 to his views further 
than he was convinced they were riujht. He soui^ht and val- 
ued advice and counsel, then asked of God, and asked the 
people to pray fur him ; then ma le up his mind, and hav- 
ing so done he could not be moved. And the nation this day 
thanks God that he could not, either by threats, or entreaties, 
or motives of self-interest. In that sense, the sense of abiding 
by his conscientious convictions in tiie fear of. and putting his 
trust in God, he was self-reliant. The result is that while his 
best friend would not claim for him, what he would far less 
likel.y have claimed for himself, that he made no mistakes, tlie 
time came when all unprejudiced persons almitted that his er- 
rors were few indeed, and that they had not long to wait to find 
that the chief that they once thought such, were wisely julged 
and sagaciously timed actions, and to admit that they were 
wrong and he was right. As to the time of adopting his most 
important measures, some cliarged him with too great tardi- 
ness, others with too great haste. Tlie consequences have vin- 
dicated the soundness of his judgment and his thorough knowl- 
edge of the state of the po[)uhir mind. So it came to pass at 
length he attained a place in the confidence and love of tlie 
vast majority of the people — not alone for his kindness, good 
intentions, purity of his patriotism, and uprightness of his 
motives, but also for Ids safe judgment and great jiractical 
wisdom. 

Nor "^s this confidence and admiration confined to his own 
countrymen. The expressions of grief at his death, of respect 
for his memory, of admiring encomium on his character as a 
man and statesman, of their more than satisfaction with the 
fairness and justice and friemlliness of his conduct of foreign 
affairs, preserving peace abroad, while never sacrificing the 
honor and interests of his country, but raising it in the esti- 
mation of all men — such expressions made in evident sincer- 
ity, strongly put, and accompanied with marks of sorrow at 
his loss, show us that he had won a place as high, with a 



26 

rapidity as great, among other nations. It is little short of 
marvelous. 

There must have been in his character and talents a cause 
for this, a reason for a man's springing at once, as it were, out 
of obscurity to take rank with the foremost of the honored of 
the world. Some of the traits of character that distinguished 
President Lincoln we have already had occasion to notice. 
But a few are deserving of a more particular mention, or of 
being mentioned by themselves. 

He was a kind man. His kindness, tenderness, gentleness 
— kindred affections — were very marked. No person ever ap- 
proached him without being at once impressed that he pos- 
sessed them in very large measure. Never was mistake greater, 
or slander more wanton, than that which charged him with 
cruelty, insensibility of heart to suffering, and blood-thirsti- 
ness. Indeed, it was considered by the men of best judgment 
in the loyal States that his chief error consisted in yielding too 
readily, and too often, to his kind emotions. The loyal men 
in the border loyal States complained that from this disposition 
of his, owing to which disloyal, dangerous men, at heart trai- 
tors, plotting mischief, were left to indulge, generally, with 
impunity in their criminal conduct, the real friends of the 
Government suffered much, and their danger was increased. 
But said one of them. Dr. R, J. Breckenridge, "While we must 
find fault with his too great leniency, and suffer from it too, we 
will love him for it all the more." 

He was an unambitious man — his only ambition being to 
serve his country. The contrary has been charged, but never 
was charge made, more utterly destitute of a single particle of 
proof. Says the London Times^ — a journal always bitterly 
hostile to our cause, and while he lived, a reviler of Mr. Lin- 
coln, and, therefore we quote it, as its testimony must be re- 
garded as certainly not likely to be prejudiced in his favour — 
quote it in preference to that from friendly sources .— " Abra- 
ham Lincoln was as little of a tyrant as any man that ever lived. 
He could have been a tyrant had he pleased, but he never uttered 



27 

80 much as an ill-nature 1 speech." Yes, he could have been a 
tyrant, if his om'u patriotic nature and his conscience would 
have permitted. For the necessity of the times, the state of 
the country, required he should have and control, and exercise 
a tremendous power. Yet such was the confidence in his hon- 
esty and singleness of purposes, that no one feared for a mo- 
ment he would abuse it. Not even his enemies, who aliected 
to believe he was designing and unprincipled, and proclaimed 
that he purposed to overthrow our liberties, and make himself 
an absolute King. They did not believe so for a single ins unt. 
Their course of conduct against their language, showed that they 
did not. And the great majority, including the whole truly 
loyal portion of the people, had come, — to quote from the Lon- 
don Spectator^ — to have " such thorough belief in his honesty 
and capacity, that, had he five hours after the fall of Richmond, 
dismissed General Grant from the service without a reason, the 
people would, while still sore and wondering, have believed 
that the reason must be adequate." 

The St. Petershurgh j}^ewssa,yB (and says truly,) paying Mr. 
Lincoln the very highest style of complimentary justice, in 
striking contrast with bitter denunciations by not a few of his 
own countrymen, who falsely accused him ot the directly op- 
posite, and who ought to hang their heads at this noble and 
eloquent tribute from a foreign journal. " The observance by 
the late President, of the strictest legality in a time of fierce 
and passionate conflict, will serve as his most appropriate 
monument, his greatest claim to hist(»rical eminence, and to 
the grateful remembrance of posterity. By nothing has the 
New World so served the cause of civilization, as by placing 
at its head, in the midst of a diflicult crisis, the citizen Lincoln, 
and showing to mankind that the Aphorism handed down to 
posterity by Home, inter anna silent leges, by no means forms 
an absolute rule for the political life of nations. Over the 
tomb of the murdered President, his mourning fellow citizens 
might inscribe the following epitaph : — "Amid the terrors and 
tempests of war, he hurled the lightning and thunder against 



28 

the enemies of his country ; and although wielding unbounded 
military power, he, as President of a Republic, remained a 
peaceful citizen ; and in an epoch pregnant with dangers, he 
laid no violent hand on laws established in a time of peace." 

We would like to quote a similarly eloquent eulogy from tlie 
St. Peiei'shur^h Journal^ but must content ourselves with a 
couple of sentences. " The immovable lirmness of his (Mr. 
Lincoln's) convictions, and the constancy of his faith in the 
cause ot the American Union, -nade him always equal to every 
trial, and brought about the final success which he has just 
sealed with his blood." " It was neither political passion, nor 
party spirit, nor hatred, nor vengeance, which had armed the 
hand of this })atriot with an inflexible energy, but a conviction 
of duty, a desire to re-establish upon broad, solid and durable 
bases, union in the bosom of the Great Eepublic." 

Mr. Lincoln was charitable, without malice, incapable of 
being provoked to a harsh or vindictive expression, much less 
action. Xo man was ever more harshly reviled, ridiculed, mis- 
represented. He was pursued with a relentless malignity, per- 
haps without parallel. His words were perverted, his motives 
impugned, even his person caricatured and made the subject 
of coarse and vulgar jokes. He was represented as an ape, 
an idiot, a clown. His natural good humour, accompanied 
with a lively sense of the ludicrous, and a habit he had of il- 
lustrating by anecdote, was brought against him, and he was 
called a bufibon. Regardless of consistency, the same who at 
one time denounced him as little better than an idiot, at an- 
other, would charge that he was a dangerous intriguer, a cun- 
ning, deej) designer, a manager at will, for the basest and 
wickedest purposes, of Counsellers, Statesmen and Generals, 
and of armies of thinkers and patriots, to be and do all which 
demand the very highest intellect the world ever produces. — 
His speeches, messages. State papers were laughed at, and af- 
fectedly iiiourned over as a disgrace to the country. Yet under 
this load of obhxpiy, notwithstanding this pitiless storm of bit- 
ter railing and denunciation, this persecuting, cruel, malignity, 



29' 

Abraham Lincoln was never provoked to utter an uiikiuJ 
worJ, nor to take vengeance, having full power to do so, nor 
to show resentment, nor to turn aside from the even tenor of 
his way, nor to lose his perfect equanimity. That was some- 
thing to which only true greatness ever attained. lie could 
truly say at the close of his life, — ''With charity for all, with 
malice towards none." He often stood between his defamers 
aiid the deserved punishment he was urged to inflict. lie 
could not stoo}> nor turn from the great duties and heavy re- 
sponsibilities of his ofHce, to even cherish in his heart, much 
less in(hilge indeed, in private animosities. In all his public 
papers there is not an allusion in auger to any one. 

Yet he was unalterably firm. As he himself said, and said 
truly, "• In the end the decision must rest with me." So 
when once he made up his mini, wdiich he did carefully, after 
considering the matter in all its bearings, conscientiously and 
prayerfully, and after arriving at the conviction that he was 
right, nothing could move him, neither any appeal of friend- 
ship nor display of hostility. And the most intelligent men 
have expressed utter astonishment at the thoroughness of his 
acquaintance with the matter in regard to which he had to de- 
cide and act, — manifesting a marvellous industry and extent of 
study. 

He was a deejily serious man. This assertion would sur- 
prise shallow observers, or such as have been misled by having 
seen and known him only through misrepresenting )tedia, and 
who have been accustomed to hear him called '' old joker," 
"clown," " buffoon," etc. But no honest, thinking, discern- 
ing person could fail to see that he was serious even to sadness. 
No one couLl sit and ([uietly, and at ease and uurestraiued, 
converse with him familiarly, and look into his mild, gentle 
eye, without being impressed with the conviction, even though 
anecdotes had fallen from him, and his countenance had light- 
ed up at times with playful humor — that his soul was a great 
deep of seriousness. Through his gentle eyes, one would look 
and see that behind them, was a vast spirit accustomed to pro- 



30 

found self-communings, and communings with truth. In fact, 
his humor, which so offended the very nice sensibilities of 
some, was as the merest ripple, or as the light froth that rests 
on the surface of the ocean. And we have often thought it was 
most kindly Providential that he had it. For it was the pre- 
servative of both his physical and mental energies from being 
crushed to death by the tremendously oppressive weight of caies 
he was compelled to bear. 

One whose tastes and occupation has made him a close ob- 
server of countenances, said that Mr. Lincoln •' had the sad- 
dest countenance he ever saw." 

We have spoken of his unfailing hopefulness, and of his be- 
lief in God. We believe he was a true Christian. Pious men, 
Ministers of Christ, who had good opportunities to judge, 
among them his own pastor in Washington, were convinced of 
this. He was a constant and devout student of the scriptures. 
It is said that on one occasion he was, with a number of other 
officers, civil and military, on a steamboat going to Fortress 
Monroe. He was missed from the company, who were mirth- 
fully enjoying themselves, and was discovered sitting by him- 
self, in a quiet, retired place, which he had sought out, read- 
ing the well-worn pocket bible, his constant companion. What 
a light that beautiful incident sheds on his character. And 
who would not feel glad that the man, to whom the interests of 
the country were committed, was such a man ? No one who 
was not a student of the sacred scriptures, could have issued 
such a paper as was his last inaugural message. We saw that 
paper ridiculed, sneered at, after its delivery, as a disgrace to 
the nation, and his friends appealed to, to say they were ashamed. 
A mere time-serving person, one of shallow and unoriginal 
mind, one in the unreflecting habit of making up his opinion — 
prejudiced too — from the ambitious harangues usual on such 
occasions, might fail into that blunder. For it was such a pa- 
per as one does not often see in these days from high places — 
nor has seen since the days of Cromwell. Its voice is like 
that of one of the old prophets. There is no self in it, no 



31 

boasting, no effort at declamation, no appeal to passions. It 
is full of God. of calm trust in Him, of looking to Ilim, of 
submission to His will, expressed in scriptural language. The 
fear that it would disgrace us in the eyes of other nations need 
not have been felt, and had far better for the reputation for 
good judgment of those having it, not have been uttered. The 
British, Standard speaks of it as " the most remarkable thing 
of the sort ever pro* ounced by any President of the United 
States, from the first day until now. Its Alpha and its Omega is 
Almighty God, the God of justice and the Father of mercies, 
who is working out the purposes of his love. It is invested 
with a dignity and pathos which lift it high above every thing 
of the kind, whether in the Old World or the New. The whole 
thing puts us in mind of the best men of the English Com- 
monwealth ; there is in fa'.:t much of the old prophet about it." 
Says the London Economist " He drew up his final inaug- 
ural in a style which extorted from critics so hostile as the Sat- 
urday Keviewers a burst of involuntary admiration." His 
other papers, though in less measure, were like it. 

We cannot dwell longer on this part of our subject. The 
future will be more ready than the present, to put it on record 
that Abraham Lincoln was a great m^n, worthy of the conn- 
try which gave George Washington to the world, to v\ hom 
even now foreign writers are fond of comparing him. 

President Lincoln fell by the hand of the assassin. Who 
was the assassin? J. Wilkes Booth. Yes, in a little higher 
sense than the pistol witii which he committed the deed. The 
real assassin was that same foul, ferocious spirit which sought 
the assassination of the country, the demon spirit begotten of 
slavery. The assassination of President Lincoln, and the 
Providentially deleated design to add thereto the assassination 
of Vice President Johnson, Secretaries Seward and Stanton, 
General Grant, Chief Justice Chase, and perhaps others, was 
but the logical culmination of the acts of treason, rebellion, 
savage barbarity to prisoners, vindictive massacres, and mur- 
ders, violation of oaths, robberies, arsons, and attempts to de- 



32 

stro}' the lives of non-combatants, of women and children, by 
])recipitating cars from rail road tracks, and by introducing the 
plagne of yellow fever, by means of infected clothing into 
populous cities, &c., to which that spirit prompted. Whether 
instigated by rebel chiefs or not — and that it was — there is ev- 
idence enough to satisfy all unprejudiced persons — yet the re 
bellion is guilty of the murder. It quite consists with buch 
ferocious proclamations as that outlawing General Butler, ard 
officers serving under him, and with numerous oiders put o't'.. 
by official authority, which all will lemember. Yet are not 
those throughout the North free from guilt who joined in furi- 
ous denunciations and stirred up liatrcd against President Lin- 
coln, until it was not uncommon to hear persons influenced by 
such defamation, express the wish, that he was, as they de- 
clared he deserved to be, put to death. 

It was the highest crime against man. Cesides simple mur- 
der — the chief criminality of which is in that man is " the 
image of God 'L. ^ was the murder of one who as the ruler 
is the image of God. And it was treason against the govern- 
ment over which he ruled by the will of the people ex])ressed 
in the constitutional manner. It was a not less atrocious mur- 
der than any of which profane history makes record. It was 
a murder which carries us back to the dark, very dark, ages, 
when secret, cowardly assassination was called heroism. It 
shows that slavery is of darkness, anl wuuM jdunge us back 
into those midnight ages — if it could ! It was unjustified by 
any gain that could accrue to the cause in the interests of which 
it was professedly done. The rebellion could not be served 
by it — it was substantially, hopelessly crushed. And in Abk^- 
iiAM Lincoln, its promoters lost their best friend, who on the 
very day preceding his murder, had, in Cabinet Council, plead- 
ed for leniency towards them. Says the London Times, "" In 
all America there was })erhaps not one man who less deserved 
to be the victim of this revolution than he who has fallen," 

and says this in allusion to his mo leration and kindness of 

intentions towards the rebels. 



33 

For his own host historical fame, he couM not, perhaps, have 
fallen at a more fit moment. Tie had lived to see the country, 
under his administration, carried through the mighty struggle, 
and saved from its long peril. He had lived to see the hopes 
and pl^rophecies of his country's foes brought to naught. — 
Though he did not live to hear of it, yet he did live until, by his 
crder, our flag was again raised to float over Fort Sumter, on 
the anniversary of the day on which it was compelled, by the 
ebel foe, to be lowered — on the anniversary of which he, too, 
by a strange Providence, was stricken down by the same foe. 
The flag went down before that foe when he was in the fresh 
pride o^fcis vaunted strength ; the President fell the victim of 
his reveafce in his expiring frenzy. He died having such al- 
most unrTunded confidence and aflPection of all lovers of lib- 
•erty thrn^hont the worll, as few have been so happy as to 
enjoy. And he died in all his integrity and simplicity un- 
stained. Had he lived, he might have made many enemies 
— almost certainly would, in view of the wide diversity of 
•sectiraents on reconstruction, (fee, and might have failed. His 
work w^as done, and iiod, who gave him to the nation, took 
"him away. While the crime of his murder will abide an in- 
delible foul slain upon the immediately guilty parties, and also 
to stir up fresh execration against slavjiry, and new determi- 
Tiation that it shall utterlv perish, yet Providence permitted it. 
Though lae permitted it. He suffered not the assasiu to escape. 
He Himself disabled him, gave him his death wound within 
an instant after he had permitted him to inflict the fatal hurt. 
And He, too, prevented the carrying out the several measures 
intended to conceal the criminals, and also hindered the exe- 
cution of the further intentions of the conspirators, having ref- 
erence to such a disorganization of the Government as might 
result in a revolution favorable to the retrieving of the dying 
cause of the rebellion. 

It was a singularly mysterious but, we are sure, a wise Pro- 
vidence. We will not murmur. Even out of this good will 

come — has already come. 1st, God by it says, " Be still, and 
I) 



34 

know that I am God ; 1 will be exalted ainony; the nations, I 
will be exalted in the earth." lie will have ns put onr trust in 
Him alone, and not in an arm of flesh. He will have us as- 
cribe to Him the wisJom, and the power, and the glory. 2nd. 
Possibly there was danger, and God saw it, and interfered ta 
prevent it by permitting his assassination, that owing to the 
remarkable gentleness and kindness of President Lincoln, 
and his pleadings for leniency, the claims of justice would be 
sacrificed to those of mercy. Indeed the whole Northern peo- 
ple were in danger of falling into that error. It was necessary 
treason should be ma :le detestable ; and that furthermore the 
undying, implacable, unappeasable hate of the spirit of slavery, 
which no kindness can touch, no gentleness soften, no gene- 
rosity affect, should be manifested by a crime even so appall- 
ing as that of the martyrdom of such a good and great — ^great 
because good — man as Abkauam Lincoln. 

The punishment of traitors is not vengeance in the evil 
sense. It is as truly a necessity of justice as the capital pun- 
ishment of the murderer. It is a higher crime than murder. 

Is treason a crime worthy of death ? Then by wliat right 
can any denounce it as wicked revenge to inflict the penalty ? 
If it is wrong to punish the traitor, then abolish the law on 
treason. If the law is right, then it is wickel, factious, dis- 
loyal to tlie Government, to cry out against its execution, and 
to denounce the Government for doing its duty, as if it was 
malicious, revengjful, and bloodthirsty. And if ever treason 
may be justly punished surely it may bo in the case of those 
who have conspired causelessly against this Government ; have 
covered the land with blood, and filled it with sorrow. Their 
crime is peculiarly heinous. We do not say the Government, 
or its constitutional authorities, must punish the traitors with 
death, if convicted, that they should not pardon. We say, 
let them do as in their judgj^ment they shall deem best for the 
country and for all concerned. And it must be conceded that 
they have the best means to make up a just judgment. And 
let them exercise their sense of duty in the matter, untran\- 



35 

melleil by threats or complaiuts. Good citizens will thus let 
them. None will rejoice more heartily Ihari we, to see mercy 
shown to the full extent, that those in authority — in whose in- 
tegrity and judgment we have great confidence — may decide, 
can be shown, without prejudice to righteousness and truth. 

Finally, we have already seen some good, and mention only, 
That it would seem as if it alone remained that this deed should 
be done, to fully justify, not merely the righteousness of our 
cause in our struggle with the rebellion, but our form of gov- 
ernment itself, before all nations, and for the encouragement 
of the friends of liberty everywhere. It was confidently said 
by the enemies of this form of government, "It cannot en- 
dure, will fall to pieces." Therefore when the war broke out, 
they said the time of our end had come — that we could not 
put down the rebellion except by putting down liberty, and 
our boasted free institutions too. But seeing they were likely 
to be disappointed in their first expectations, they took new 
courage in the hope they boldly declared, that the government 
could not but go to pieces when the time for another Presiden- 
tial election should come, and asserted that either it must go 
to pieces, or Mr. Lincoln must, and probably would, usurp 
dictatorial authority, prevent an election, and proclaim him- 
self permanent ruler. The election caused not a jar. Then 
came the great peril — as friends of other forms of government 
would consider it, and the like to which would plunge most 
others at any time, — perhaps any other at such a time — into 
fresh revolution or anarchy, or let it tall into the hands of a 
military chieftain, who wouM make himself an emperor. But 
while the nation was suddenly plunge 1 down from joy and ex- 
ultation, a great depth into sorrow and mourning, the machin- 
ery of government moved on without a break or a jolt, and no 
one thought of danger. We come forth from tlie war, and all 
its vast and numberless perils, safe ; our g jverument tried and 
justified, and become the wonder, the fear, and the admiration 
of the world. For the first, we know our own strength and 



ClJ^ 



36 



resources, anil power of endTirauce. But all will be in vain 
unless we have learned the great truth, and continue in it, — • 
" The Lord God OmnipoteDt reigneth !" and "In God is our 
ti-ust," 



Lb My 13 



I 



I 



